Settlement and Development
The region's relative lack of water and wood affected the development of the United States. Settlers heading westward often attempted to pass through the region as quickly as possible en route to what was considered to be better land farther west. These early settlers gave telling names to the various streams of the region, such as "Sweetwater Creek" or "Poison Creek". Because it was not considered desirable, the area became one of the last strongholds of independent American Indians. Railroad interests seeking rights-of-way through the region also benefited from the popular belief that the land was commercially valueless.
By the mid-19th century, people had begun settling in the region despite its poor reputation. The local inhabitants came to realize the area was at the time well suited for farming, due in part to the fact that large portions of the region sit atop one of the world's largest underground reservoirs, the Ogallala Aquifer. Experts of the era proposed theories that maintained the earlier reports had been accurate and the climate had changed. Some even credited the settlers themselves as having caused the change by planting crops and trees. The slogan "rain follows the plow" was created to describe this belief. Today these theories are discredited.
Additionally, it has been demonstrated that while there is an abundant amount of water in the Ogallala Aquifer, it is slow to replenish itself, with most of the water in the Aquifer having been there since the last Ice Age. Some current estimates predict the usefulness of the Aquifer for agriculture to subside and be useless as soon as the early parts of the mid-21st century, leading current farmers to turn away from irrigated agriculture using the aquifer.
Read more about this topic: Great American Desert
Famous quotes containing the words settlement and/or development:
“The settlement of America had its origins in the unsettlement of Europe. America came into existence when the European was already so distant from the ancient ideas and ways of his birthplace that the whole span of the Atlantic did not widen the gulf.”
—Lewis Mumford (1895–1990)
“For the child whose impulsiveness is indulged, who retains his primitive-discharge mechanisms, is not only an ill-behaved child but a child whose intellectual development is slowed down. No matter how well he is endowed intellectually, if direct action and immediate gratification are the guiding principles of his behavior, there will be less incentive to develop the higher mental processes, to reason, to employ the imagination creatively. . . .”
—Selma H. Fraiberg (20th century)